Gary Brantley is an innovative technology strategist renowned for cultivating productive collaboration through organizational transformation, delegating resources toward increasing digital inclusion, and implementing an entirely remote workforce infrastructure. He brings more than 20 years of experience in the technology sector and 17 years of leadership to Beazer Homes as the Chief Technology Officer. In this role, Gary is responsible for assessing the relative impact of emerging technology and to accelerate digital transformation.
As the former CIO for the City of Atlanta, Gary focused on organizational transformation by altering the department culture to achieve a competitive advantage and address future technology challenges. He developed and implemented a strategy centered on how impact and influence can peacefully collide to empower leaders to build effective teams, healthy workplace cultures, and thriving business ecosystems with organizational transformation. In this regard, he moved from present planning to future business continuity to refocus and re-energize the entire workforce, from talent acquisition and retention to repurposing staff into more vital roles to meet the City’s technology needs. Gary also created an Atlanta CIO Advisory Board to continue pushing the envelope with input from other CIOs, experts within the technology sector.
Gary has also led initiatives surrounding partnerships with companies and organizations such as AT&T, Sprint and the Atlanta Police Foundation to upgrade and replace over 1,000 laptops and PCs, arrange over 250 mobile hotspots and provide funding for training in STEM-based education for the Centers of Hope in Atlanta.
Before joining AIM, Gary was the CIO of one of the largest school districts in the United States. In that capacity, Gary spearheaded the district’s largest technology overhaul, Digital Dreamers, which included the distribution of over 70,000 end user devices to teachers as well as students.
Gary began his career with IBM before becoming the Regional Operations Director for MCIWorldCom. There, he continued to have an impact on technology and took that expertise to the Ohio State Department as the Director of Technology. He went on to become the CIO for the one of the largest urban school districts in Ohio. Gary’s admirable professionalism and unyielding dedication have earned him numerous awards and accolades and has led him to write his first book, The Art of Organizational Transformation: 7 steps to Impact & Influence. Gary was featured in the list of Top 30 Technologists, Transformers and Trailblazers by the Center for Digital Education in 2015, ComputerWorld’s Premier Top 100 Technology Leaders for 2017. In addition, he was awarded with the Making IT Happen award from the International Society for Technology in Education. Gary was also a finalist for the 2017-2018 and 2020 Georgia CIO Leadership Association’s CIO of the Year ORBIE Award. He was also recognized as one of Government Tech Magazines 2020 Top Doers and Dreamers.